Rosso Antico Marble

In 1887 the Lambeth marble merchants Farmer & Brindley were advertising Rosso Antico ‘from rediscovered quarries of Greece’. They were listed as quarry proprietors of the marble from 1899-1923 and used it for the Cathedral entrance paving in 1903, the sanctuary screen and floor in 1905-6 and the Lady Chapel in 1908. The colour of the marble ranges from purple to violet, sometimes banded with white stripes and black veins. It appears faded when unpolished, scuffed or weathered, as when used on the floor or steps or exposed to the elements. It comes from the Mani, the remote and mountainous central spur of the Greek mainland which reaches out southwards into the Mediterranean Sea.

There are two areas where the marble has been quarried. The first where outcrops of the white-banded variety meet the sea at the Kalivia/Paganea promontory, near Skutari in the outer Mani, was rediscovered by a French scientific expedition in 1829. They named it Marbre Rouge Antique de Skutari. Specimens of this marble were sent by Greece to the Great Exhibition in London in 1851, but its use elsewhere seems to have been limited. More recently, quarrying took place at Paganea from about 1949 until 1964, when 20 men with jack-hammers and explosives were employed, and the marble sent by sea to Piraeus and thence to Alexandria and England. The plain, dark red marble used to decorate the transept piers in the Cathedral during this period appears to be from there.

The other area where the marble is found is the deep Mani. Outcrops and boulders of Rosso Antico and evidence of small-scale quarrying can be seen to the south of the abandoned village of Mianes on the heights of Cape Tenaro (also known as Cape Matapan) where the Taygetos mountains finally run into the sea. The marble can also be found below at sea-level near Porto Kisternes and Kanoghia. The pedestal for a statue of Lord Byron, presented by the Greek Government and erected at Hyde Park Corner in 1881, was reported in The Times to be ‘the Rosso Antico of the quarries at Cape Matapan’. An earlier memorial statue of Byron by Thorwaldsen had been refused admission to Westminster Abbey by Dean Ireland, because of the poet’s lifestyle, and went to Trinity College, Cambridge. Rosso Antico panels were also used on the floor of the Oxford Examination Schools building, completed in 1882.

But it is seven miles further north, close to the deserted village of Profitis Ilias (Elias) and two miles west of the local harbour at Aghios Kiprianos (where Marmor had its local base), that several quarries, some ancient, can be found and the hilltops and village itself stand above mounds of purple marble rubble resulting from early 20th century quarrying. The ancient quarries were discovered in 1850 by a sculptor and lecturer at the Athens Polytechnic School named Siegel, and by 1902 it was reported that the firm of Marmor, based at 18 Finsbury Square in London and the largest quarry owner in Europe, had purchased the site and was opening up the quarries to extract the regularly banded, red and grey Rosso Antico marble to be found there.

But of course this marble was used long before the 19th century. Indeed the term antico indicated its use in Classical times. Carved blocks decorated the Treasury of Atreus in 13th century BC Mycenae and can be seen in the British

Museum. But it was during the Roman Empire, particularly under Hadrian in the second century AD, that it was most popular, both for buildings and for sculpture – notably a bust of a priest and several statues of fauns (companion of Bacchus, the god of wine). Much Roman Rosso Antico was later re-used, as in the sanctuary steps of the church of Santa Prassede in Rome.

The stone continues to be used in the Mani. It can be seen set into churches, private houses and even garden walls. But overgrown tracks and long abandoned quarries show that overseas demand has moved on. It seems not inappropriate that here in the Cathedral this ancient purple marble, associated with ritual and red wine, should decorate the entrance to the main sanctuary where Mass is celebrated.